"Jake, you got Homer in there with you?" My brother Tom's voice. "Mom's on the phone, stop him yapping - " He opened the door and stepped in. He looked around, confused. "Who are you?" he demanded of Tobias. "I'm Tobias. I'm a friend of Jake's." "Well, where is he?" "Oh . . . he's around," Tobias said. Tom looked down at me. There was a strange smell about him. My dog brain couldn't quite identify it. It was an unsettling, dangerous smell. And somehow, in my own mind, I heard the echo of a laugh. A very human laugh I had heard the night before as Visser Three swallowed the Andalite whole. "Bad dog," Tom said to me. "You keep quiet. Bad dog." And then he left. I was devastated. I wasn't a bad dog. Not really. I was just barking because some other dog was in MY yard. Bad dog? I was a bad dog? No, I wanted to be a good dog. I crept into the corner, utterly miserable. Tobias knelt down and patted my head. When he scratched me behind the ears, I felt a little better.











